Editor's Note

Abstract

How do students acquire knowledge and more complex ways of thinking through the process of participating in a course over a quarter or a semester? This question has achieved the status of persistent companion for many university and seminary faculty. It informs their composition of courses and their reflection on what is occurring as their courses progress. It comes sharply into focus when professors grapple with student performance at the conclusion of a course, both students' achievements and their shortfalls in learning. There is no single answer to this question. How knowledge is acquired and more complex ways of thinking developed depend on multiple factors; among them are the shape of disciplines and their core questions, concepts, and methodologies, what students bring with them by way of preparation and culture, the instructor's degree of artful pedagogical skill, and larger institutional and social factors affecting students and faculty alike. Still, reflective teachers develop and refine partial answers to this question through careful attention to their own practice of teaching and by joining their reflections to larger conversations about the dynamics of learning. Each contributor to this issue of Teaching Theology and Religion addresses this question with careful attention to pedagogical practice in local contexts, and joins their description, analysis, and interpretation to larger conversations about student learning. Michel Andraos explores the question of knowledge acquisition and composition of meaning in a globally diverse seminary classroom through the lens of epistemic coloniality. He strives to imagine and enact an intercultural, de-colonial pedagogy. W. Jay Moon also is concerned with teaching inter-culturally in a seminary setting and ponders the effects of learning preferences – printed or oral – on students' performance and so on a professor's capacity to accurately assess their learning. Alicia Batten writes from a Canadian university perspective about a larger contextual question. Drawing on the work of George Lakoff and Mark Johnson on metaphor, Batten probes the degree to which the language of “learning outcomes” resonates with the values of contemporary academic capitalism and obscures important dimensions of knowledge and learning in religious studies. “In the Classroom” contains three more contributions on capstone courses and integrative seminars, initially submitted in response to a TTR call. David Bains describes comparative book reviews, Darren Dias and Michael Attridge develop the summative evaluation for ministry, and Kristi Upson-Saia looks at the role of religious studies researcher as a resource for students' learning in the capstone course. All three contributors present quite distinct but recognizably related ways to help students develop more complex ways of thinking, through application of disciplinary methods and synthesis of their knowledge and learning over a course of study. You will find two elaborated analyses of course strategy in this issue. Jill DeTemple unpacks how she employs globalization as a conceptual and theoretical tool in her world religions course. She finds the concept of lived religion particularly effective for students in making the bridge from concrete description to globalization as conceptual tool. Michael Satlow wrestles with a pedagogical experiment he conducted over two iterations of a course on Ancient Jewish History and Texts. He designed the experiment to help students make the move from absorbing narratives provided by the professor to being able to think as historians in working with primary texts. Wikis and Wikipedia played a role in his experiment. Dominic Doyle and Michael Nichols provide teaching tactics on analysis of texts and construction of argument respectively. Also included in this issue of Teaching Theology and Religion is a 2010 working bibliography of publications and presentations by Wabash Center program and grant participants that relate to the work of the Wabash Center. This bibliography updates the one that appeared in volume 10, number 3 (July 2007). This issue contains books reviews covering a wide variety of works related to teaching theology and religion. Peruse the reviews to find a title that may advance your understanding of how students acquire knowledge and develop more complex ways of thinking in your courses. Finally, to repeat a solicitation included in my note from the last issue, TTR is seeking submissions of teaching tactics related explicitly to online or hybrid contexts. Visit http://www.wabashcenter.wabash.edu/journal/article2.aspx?id=14417 for details on the structure of these 400-word pieces.